Reviews

Once upon a time, when a young girl asked a librarian for a princess book, she meant a traditional fairy tale featuring a princess. Now, as likely as not, she wants a book from Levine's series the Princess Tales, small volumes that borrow elements from folk-tales to create lively, new stories... A few black-and-white drawings illustrate the stories, but the real draw of these attractively designed books is the inventive use of folkloric elements woven into charming, original stories.
Booklist

Light and breezy additions to the series. In For Biddle's Sake, young Parsley is turned into a toad by Bombina the fairy, and must convince Prince Tansy, the long-suffering younger brother of mean twins, to propose marriage to her in order to break the spell. In The Fairy's Return, a princess and a baker's son are infatuated with one another; Lark loves that Robin dares to joke with her, and Robin loves that she enjoys his jokes...Elements of various fairy tales, including "The Golden Goose," "Rapunzel," and "Puddocky," make their way into these funny stories. Eccentric and misguided characters abound; Robin's father, who fancies himself a genius poet, comes up with non-rhyming gems like, "Royalty and commoners must never mix./Remember this, or you will be in a predicament." Kids will love figuring what word he should have used in each poem, they'll cheer for the plucky heroines, and they'll relish the fairy-tale endings.
School Library Journal

Levine continues her winning series of Princess Tales...creating two new stories from well-known classics...This is all done in deliriously funny and well-wrought prose, full of sly wit and clever asides. Getting all the references is not required for laughing aloud.
Kirkus Reviews